Occupational health and safety news and guidance

A Sheffield property developer has been fined for dangerous safety
failings after a building partly collapsed and sent tonnes of rubble
through a neighbouring shop roof - just missing two shopworkers.

Developer Ghulam Rasul put the lives of the workers and of the local
community at serious risk when he ignored a legal
enforcement notice ordering him to halt all demolition work at the site
because the building was potentially unstable.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) brought the prosecution after
investigating the incident at Steetley Chambers, a former industrial
premises, between Stoke Street and Effingham Road in Sheffield, on 4
February last year.

On 25 May, Sheffield Magistrates heard that HSE found Mr. Rasul
restarted demolition work on the site in late 2010, breaching a
Prohibition Notice served on him in April 2008 relating to serious
safety concerns. By doing so, the building was weakened further,
increasing its instability and the potential for a collapse, and putting
anyone near it at serous risk of injury.

On 4 February, the gable end of the two-storey building did collapse.
Around ten tonnes of brick and rubble crashed through the roof of the
fishing tackle shop next door, which was open for business, and narrowly
missed the shopworkers.

Ghulam Rasul, of Balfour Road, Sheffield, pleaded guilty to an offence
under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 and to
breaching a Prohibition Notice. He was fined a total of £6,000 and
ordered to pay £2,418 in costs.